?
Sorry, I can’t follow this story…

The Cubase Tempo Track is never empty, so I’m going to assume that there was only one Tempo Event registered.
Maybe I’m reading this wrongly… are you referring to a Tempo Change, as in it starts at 112bpm and at measure 33 it changes to 122bpm?
Or are you referring to just changing the overall Tempo (once) for the entire Song? Confused…

You say you recorded a Program Change at the end of the song???
I’m lost, why? Not that I need to know but was there a purpose for this or am I taking “end of the song” too literally?

When a MIDI song finishes, the last settings persist… so if a Part has changed from being initially a piano to, say, a flute somewhere during the composition, when it reaches the end, it remains a flute.

MIDI data persists… it’s like a Newtonian Law… a body in motion will tend to stay in motion until a force acts to stop it.
A program changed will stay changed, until another program change tells it to do otherwise.

Same is true for Volume, Pan position, or dozen other things you might have manipulated.

This means, when you STOP playback and return to the top of the composition, unless there is a message or messages to tell the Tone Generator to change back, it will remain where the data left it. This can be devastating if, for example, you Faded Out volumes to zero… you return to the top… All sounds are now at 0 Volume.

You get around this by:
__ recalling the STORED program - restores start condition
__ placing messages in the start of each Track to reset everything to start condition
__ knowing and being aware of the importance of “start condition” as a concept. It is an important concept in *automation* — you are making changes along a timeline, the finished result often is quite different from the start condition. You must preserve your start condition, separately, if you are going to return to it.

Warning: If you place Program Changes, Tempo changes, Volume changes, etc., etc., in the Track data, you must be very, very careful about when you execute “STORE Song & Perf” because if you do so immediately AFTER the composition has played, you will have stored these Changes as your Start Condition. Ouch! And imagine if you had faded every body Out to 0 volume… storing in that condition would be catastrophic!

To avoid this, make sure your Performance data is actually back to the Start Condition you desire, BEFORE you STORE the Song&Perf.
Make sense?
This way all you need do to have subsequent replays to be correct, is Recall the program.

Sorry if I wasn't clear. The tempo track is indeed never empty so let me rephrase that. There are no tempo changes in the track on cubase, while I did record them on the montage. From bar 44 to 46 the tempo gradually increases.

For the program change, you are not taking "end of the song" too literally. On the very last beat of the song I programmed (recorded actually, since you can't manually insert a PC in a song on a specific moment in the timeline) a PC to change the patch on my sound module, via an active zone on midi ch12, because I don't have any hands free or the time to change it manually.

So, is there a way to delete the tempo change I recorded into the song? Preferably on Montage itself.

Thanks,

Stef

I tested the "store song & perf settings"-button again.

Imported the song to Montage, checked and it works as it should. Then made sure the cursor was at the beginning. Even press play for a second to make sure it definitely has the begin settings, and then set the cursor again to the beginning. Then press "store song & perf settings". And at this point it goes wrong. The program change is duplicated to the beginning again. I can see that also when I drag the stored midi file in cubase.

So, is there a way to delete the tempo change I recorded into the song? Preferably on Montage itself.

Ok thanks for the clarification.

You have recorded a real-time Tempo change into a MONTAGE Song, and you already Stored the Song&Perf—and you want to know how you undo it. You are given the option to undo it immediately after recording it… but what if you didn’t?

Yes, you can (I’ve been here, done this. and fortunately, I saved the t-shirt). First make note of the Song Length in measures - you’ll need this information. Name your Song, it helps.

What you’ll need to do is:
Go to an empty MONTAGE Pattern
Tap “Edit/Job” > “Song/Event” > “Get Phrase” > set the dialog boxes that appears to reach into your Song
Set Track = All
Set the Start Measure = 001
Set the End Measure = as required for the entire Song length

The Pattern destination will already be set, Scene = 1
Tap the box “Get Phrase from Song”

This will place the entire Song in Scene 1 of the current Pattern
Press [EXIT] to return to the Pattern Seq main screen
Set the TEMPO to the value you desire
Tap the box “Chain”
You will be asked “Please store the Pattern to change the chain play mode”
Tap “Store/Yes”
Tap “Edit/Job” > “Chain”

You’ll see a table with two columns… Measure and Scene
Measure = 001
Tap the “+” in the Scene box to enter Scene 1

The data in the lower right corner will show you the Length of your Chain which should be your entire composition’s length. You can play it from here to verify…
Tap the box “Convert to Song”

If you are the nervous type you can target a new (empty) Song location… but after you are sure about things you can simply overwrite your original Song location with this new updated version.

Tap “Convert”

Extra Credit:
This works because all Scenes in Pattern mode are the same Tempo, so the Tempo changes are completely ignored. So we simply are leaving them out. We simply moved your composition into a Pattern, and created a linear structure (Chain) and converted it back.

You will find this MIDI Song Pattern shufffle maneuver useful for many things, as the in-depth Edit and Job functions are found in the Pattern Sequencer. It functions as the Song construction tool… you can build a song by sections (Scenes) and then assemble the linear structure using the Chain Job… you can easily move data back and forth, either individual Tracks or as we did, the entire thing, back and forth between modes, as necessary.

“Get Phrase” and “Put Phrase” can be used to surgically fix and/or redo individual Tracks or regions of Tracks… but since Tempo is something that affects everything we used the Get Phrase to “grab” everything, and instead of using “Put Phrase” we used the CHAIN function to rewrite the Tempo structure for the entire structure.

The concept of the MIDI Song Performance Recorder is it can quickly and easily capture your multiple Part interaction with the Motion Control synthesizer… capturing every move you make, you then can, using the Get and Put Phrase and other Pattern functions, refine your work. It allows for you to jam for as long as you’d like in Song, then grab the best stuff for reassembly in the Pattern mode.

Or you can work the other (traditional way) of building the linear song by working on each section (Scene) first… chaining them, etc., etc.
Hope that helps.

Now what is the issue with the Program Change, is that working for you or not?
Let us know.

What a great idea. Works perfect!
Except... the program change gets copied to pattern when I use "Get phrase", but when I transfer it back to Song with "Convert to song", the program change is gone.That's weird.

Also, when I drag the song into cubase and import it back into montage, the program change is copied to the beginning of the song. Don't know why it does that.

I also don't understand why, when I drag the song with the tempo changes into cubase, the tempo track is a straight line on the same bpm with no changes. This is the tempo track that shows up with cmd+T right? Or are those changes found elsewhere?

Thanks!

Stef

the program change gets copied to pattern when I use "Get phrase", but when I transfer it back to Song with "Convert to song", the program change is gone.That's weird.

I’ll have to take a look at that… that is weird. The MONTAGE does not place Bank Select and PC in the Track itself so I don’t believe I have worn that t-shirt yet…

Also, when I drag the song into cubase and import it back into montage, the program change is copied to the beginning of the song. Don't know why it does that.

I’ll have to look at that too, sounds like it is doing that on purpose — so that might be a setting in the DAW… 99.99% of Program Changes are placed at the top, not the end of the composition which makes it sound like it’s doing it for you.

I also don't understand why, when I drag the song with the tempo changes into cubase, the tempo track is a straight line on the same bpm with no changes. This is the tempo track that shows up with cmd+T right? Or are those changes found elsewhere?

Again, I’ll have to look into this… you are looking in the right place.

Cubase issues all, but I will look into this for you. I’ll let you know what I find out,
Thanks for the questions… (you are expanding my been there/done that t-shirt collection! 🙂

Haha! thanks! Looking forward to hear from you

I also don't understand why, when I drag the song with the tempo changes into cubase, the tempo track is a straight line on the same bpm with no changes. This is the tempo track that shows up with cmd+T right? Or are those changes found elsewhere?

I’ll deal with the last one first. I did a test and my Tempo Changes showed up on the Cubase Tempo Track after importing using MONTAGE CONNECT.

When you “drag the song with the Tempo Changes into Cubase” — this may seem like semantics but to be clear, what you drag is just the .mid file — the MIDI event data. After you overdub record the real-time Tempo changes using the MONTAGE recorder, you press STOP, immediately, the MIDI event data is resident in the MONTAGE internal memory.

[UTILITY] > “Contents” > “Data Utility” > your data is stored in the “Song” folder. That is the data you are accessing with MONTAGE CONNECT

Make sure you are Importing the right file when you open MONTAGE CONNECT. Tap “Update Song List” especially if the program was just sitting idea — this will refresh the Song list.
I’ve run into many users who aren’t aware that once a sequence is created or loaded to the MONTAGE, it remains in internal memory until you specifically, directly DELETE it, or initialize all data.

If you load a .mid file to MONTAGE using a USB stick, it goes into the SONG FOLDER (Internal Memory) along side any you recorded using the on board sequencer. If you load something four times from a USB stick, you will have four copies with the same name but different numbers (this stops happening once you become aware of how the memory works).
You will always recognize this USB stick LOAD: “Contents” > “Load” routine because the CONTENT TYPE will be “.mid File”

However, there is a different operation — you also have an option to load something from the SONG FOLDER to the Sequencer, which is simply telling the MONTAGE in which Song Number slot you wish to place it in.
You will always recognize this routine because the CONTENT TYPE will be “Song” or “Song&Perf”

To make sure you are dragging and dropping the correct data from the Song Folder, you can have MONTAGE CONNECT sort your “IMPORT” view of the Song Folder by DATE (so that either the most recent is at the top of the list, or click it again to reverse the order). You can also refer to title which includes the NUMBER just before the SONG NAME.

I want to make sure this is not the issue… I could easily Import my MONTAGE Song with Tempo changes intact.
Double check you were importing the correct item.

Let us know. (Still haven’t gotten to the other questions yet… standby).

the program change gets copied to pattern when I use "Get phrase", but when I transfer it back to Song with "Convert to song", the program change is gone.That's weird.

As a disclaimer - since I don't use the pattern feature hardly at all - I'm not speaking from any level of even surface experience. So this is really just casual discussion to perhaps help the experts better flesh out something more precise.

When I see the word "convert" related to MIDI - I start associating the operation with similar functions in Montage. To me, this appears to be a "sister" operation to the "convert song to ARP" feature. Something I'm a bit more familiar with. I've tried to embed various MIDI messages inside user arps - but the conversion to an ARP filters out various things. I think that PCs are one of these things because embedding a PC change inside an ARP is deemed to be invalid (although I'd prefer to make that choice myself). Still, I wonder if the relationship to arpeggio's filter logic dictates, in part, why certain MIDI messages appear to be filtered when doing the "convert to song" operation for patterns.

Again - no authoritative information here. Just wondering if there may be parallels between the two "faces" of MIDI playback/recording between patterns and arps.

the program change gets copied to pattern when I use "Get phrase", but when I transfer it back to Song with "Convert to song", the program change is gone.That's weird.

A Program Change at the end is problematic if you happen to [STORE] things after the Program Change plays. Say you have that end of Song Program Change at measure 145 (the very end of the Song). If you press [STORE] — easy mistake to make, you realize you now have stored whatever that instrument change is as the Start Condition. Therefore, you have to be extremely conscious of when you Store, and on the lookout for any routine that is going automatically STORE for you…

My Experiment:
I have a song with Program Changes, and was able to use “Get Phrase” to bring it into a Pattern Scene, I was able to change and add what I wanted while in Pattern, and I was able to put it back in a linear Song using the “Chain” and “Convert to Song” — my Program Changes all remained where they belonged. In other words, I had no issue, at all.

I then asked myself what I was doing that you may not have done. It is a natural thing to verify your work after performing an edit. Doing so when Program Changes are involved can be catastrophic, if you do not ensure the “start condition”. “Start condition” is an important concept in any use of automation (Program Changes are a form of automation). It simply is your entire set of preferences for the condition of your mix at Measure 001.

GM uses PC extensively and all manner of CC messages to create each mix, but GM protocol ensures the “start condition” with a complete reset of all “start condition” parameter instructions (including what program to start with) on each Channel, and it does so every single time you return to measure 001. But you are not using General MIDI protocol… and no automatic reset is going to occur.

When your “start condition” is maintained by the STORED Performance (as it is here in MONTAGE), you must be vigilant about NOT letting anything change your “start condition”… which means, you manually must reset after each play through.

I believe you stored or you did not manually reset to the proper “start condition”… Doing either of these will alter your original Performance.
When you have automated changes, playing through to the end alters your Performance - whatever received your PC message is now changed. You cannot simply replay, you must RESET before you can play it again.

The Blue Flag icon
Notice on the MONTAGE MIDI Song screen, the box with “Performance Name” — when no changes have occurred to the start condition of the Performance, no icon appears above the name. However, as soon as the Performance is altered from its original condition, a blue flag icon appears to indicate — Careful! Things ain’t what they used to be, in other words, something, somewhere has changed.

When you are working with Program Changes, and Control data in the Track data, you must be exceedingly careful about what is where, when you execute your Performance STORE.

When you are going to activate the CHAIN, you are told it is going to STORE your data, do not proceed, without checking into it - if you have a blue flag showing… could happen there. Blue flag means your start condition has been altered.

If the data has all manner of program changes, volume and pan position changes, typically your mix conditions at the end of play are very different from when it started… and because MIDI settings persist (remain until told to change)… storing immediately after a play through is never recommended.

You have to be weary and absolutely check the condition of your setup. I really don’t have enough information to cover all scenarios as to what happened in your case — and this is especially difficult when I’m trying to guess what someone else did, or didn’t do, and besides, there are too many possibilities — I’d need more details. But I was able to have my Program Changes do the right thing in my experiments.

Chase Event Settings
Also, both Cubase and the MONTAGE have a function called “Chase Events” — which can look into the Track data and make sure that things are where they should be… based on the last known condition… if you fast forward to measure 97 and five Parts that have already changed programs, this function can look backward in the data of each track and update parameters so they start at the correct point for being at measure 97. But the key is, there must be an *event* in the track data. The music correctly sounds, the 5 Parts have “looked up” the most recent PC event.

This is another thing that can play havoc with you if you are updating the Performance… you fast forward to measure 97, and push play, it sounds great, you make a change and then press [STORE] you’ve now redone the Performance “start condition”, by putting these five Parts that changed in the Stored Performance (and any CC alterations on any Track) into the Performance and therefore the “start condition”.

I cannot definitively say this is what happened in your case, but I highly recommend, that you stay alert (the blue flag icon will help)… once I know all the instruments, volumes, pan positions, effect send levels, etc., etc., all the things that may change through automation… once I have them as they should be at measure 001. I [STORE] the Performance… and I avoid updating that “by accident”.

Then when I play through the entire thing… naturally when it reaches the end, it is completely changed. Before you can even play it again, you MUST reset things to the “start condition”. often there are too many parameters to do it manually, so you must recall the Performance (the one you know represents your preferences for “start condition” — the one without the Blue Flag!

You can do so by touching HOME and moving back one and forward one to reset all your settings (blue flag free).

The other method of operation in the case of program changes and CC messages that you plan to automate later in the composition… add a corresponding “start condition” message for that parameter at the top of the composition. If you are going to change the Volume at measure 129 raising it to value of 122, from the stored value of 100 (as it is in the Performance). It would be wise to insert CC7 = 100 so that returning to the top will automate the return to the stored value (without having to do the move away and back maneuvers).

And if you plan on inserting a PC late in the track, place a “start condition” PC in that same Track so as to automate the start condition… so it returns properly without that back and forth shuffle!